This invention relates to a headwear. More particularly, it relates to headwear which may be also used as a home or feeding device for a variety of flying animal life, including without limitation butterflies, birds, squirrels, and other small animals.
Various forms of headwear have been known since ancient times to confer upon the wearer a particular benefit not attainable without the headwear. For example, early warriors of various tribes, nations, cultures, as well as modern military regiments have worn headwear as a means of protection against the weaponry of adversaries. Headwear is also known to have been widely used ornamentally, as being a part of the dress used in religious ceremonies. Additionally, various headwear articles find use for protecting wearers from the rays of the sun, as in the cases of the well-known sombrero and common cowboy hat. Headwear may also function in a protective role, as in the case of various sports games where specifically-designed helmets or other headgear is required to protect a sports participant from injury.
Typically, a given article of headwear is designed for a specific use and thus comprises features unique to its particular intended end-use. Because of their specific design characteristics, individual articles of headwear are unsuitable as anything other than a hat or helmet in their intended use. Thus, according to the prior art, a hat, helmet, or other piece of headwear is useful only as a hat, helmet, or headwear article. Thus, if hats, helmets, or other pieces of headwear were to be possessed of a function other than merely being wearable on the head of a person, such articles would have extra value over similar items of the prior art which are currently being made and sold in commerce.
A major problem with the hats, helmets, and headwear articles of the prior art is that none of them thus far have proved suitable for use as a shelter or feeder for small birds, flying insects, and mammals or the like. This is due in part because in order to function as a shelter or feeder for such life forms, helmets, hats, or headwear should be able to keep the environmental elements of wind, snow, and rain from the interior volume of such headwear, while at the same time preferably affording some protection from predators. Headwear articles of the prior art do not provide such features adequately to function usefully as shelters or feeders for small birds, flying insects, and mammals or the like, while retaining their utility as an article of headwear.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,996,127 describes a wearable device for feeding and observing birds and other flying animals which comprises a hat, a support mounted on the hat and extending outwardly from the hat, and a feeder mounted on the support. When flying animals feed from the feeders, a person wearing the hat may observe them from a short distance. The device may comprise a helmet with three poles mounted on it and extending outwardly from the helmet, and a feeder hanging from each of the poles. The inventor of that device alleges that a variety of flying animals, including butterflies, hummingbirds, and other small birds may be observed using the device. However, while such a device may be used in observing the wildlife cited therein, the teachings of the ""127 patent provide no particular sheltering means for any of the wildlife, even though the helmets or headwear articles described therein are capable of being worn by a person. The present invention, on the other hand, in one of its preferred forms, provides helmets or headwear articles described therein are capable of being worn by a person and which are additionally useful for providing food or shelter for the particular wildlife forms mentioned above.
The present invention is directed at an article of headwear also having utility as a feeder or home for small animals such as birds, squirrels, and the like, which comprises: a casing portion, that includes: a top portion; a right side portion; a left side portion; a front portion; a rear portion; and a bottom portion, wherein said bottom portion includes a removable closure means, which portions collectively define an interior volume within said casing. There is also at least one hole disposed through said casing portion, to enable said animals to enter said casing portion.
According to another form of the invention, such articles further include an animal support means disposed within the interior of said casing portion, particularly in which the animal support means is removable from the interior of said casing portion. Such animal support means may include a flat floor portion or a rod which transverses the interior of the casing portion. The removable closure means may comprise a flat lower surface.
There is a hole disposed through a portion of the casing selected from the group consisting of: the front portion; the rear portion; the right side portion; the left side portion; or the top portion. The casing portion is shaped as a headwear article selected, without limitation, from the group consisting of: football helmets, baseball helmets, automotive racing helmets, construction hats, hardhats etc.